India’s infrastructure sector is entering a phase where the scale of investment is rising alongside the complexity of project delivery. Highways, bridges, industrial corridors and urban infrastructure are becoming larger, longer-duration assets, making the consequences of cost overruns, delays, quality failures and poor asset performance increasingly significant.

For developers and investors, therefore, the question is no longer simply how to build faster. It is how to make infrastructure projects more predictable and investable.

This is where technology is beginning to play a fundamentally different role. BIM, artificial intelligence, drones, LiDAR, ERP systems, predictive analytics and digital asset-management platforms are moving beyond their traditional role as productivity tools. Increasingly, they are becoming instruments for identifying risks, improving decision-making and protecting returns across the project lifecycle.

As Suneel Vora, Partner, KPMG India, observed during a discussion on the subject, technology is becoming central to managing the risks associated with capital and construction projects. The objective is to create projects that can be planned, delivered and operated successfully, while giving developers, asset owners, financiers and investors greater confidence.

The challenge is to bring technology into the equation early enough.

Risk begins before construction

For an investor, risk starts well before construction equipment reaches the site. A project in its construction phase can carry uncertainties around land acquisition, cost escalation, schedule, construction quality and future revenues. Acquiring a completed asset may reduce some of these uncertainties, but it can also mean entering at a higher valuation and potentially sacrificing some upside.

Rajesh Chaabra, Chief Technical and Sustainability Officer, NxtInfra Trust, highlighted this dilemma from an investor's perspective. “As an investor, I need to decide whether I pitch in in the project from the beginning, when the constructions are already on, or it's completed and then I minimise my risk when entering into the project.”

Technology can potentially change that equation by improving the information available to investors during the construction phase.

BIM can connect the project from concept through detailed design and construction. LiDAR and drone surveys can provide more accurate information on existing site conditions. AI can analyse data and identify potential problems, while project-management and quality-management systems can provide real-time visibility into execution.

For investors, the value lies in having greater confidence in what is actually happening on the ground. Chaabra pointed out that BIM can potentially extend from concept to as-built drawings and even maintenance planning. “Right from concept to as-built drawings and even the maintenance planning can be done… and you can through and through plan it better and know what challenges you are going to face.”

That continuity could eventually make it possible for investors to take exposure earlier in the project lifecycle without taking on the same degree of information uncertainty.

Technology’s strongest business case emerges when it is connected directly to the risks that affect project economics.

According to Nikhil Vijay Bagalkotkar, Director, Technical Sales, Autodesk, these risks can broadly be divided into three categories: cost, time and regulatory compliance.

“When you look at risk, typically, you would classify risks for a project into three broad buckets. One is cost-associated risks, cost escalations or essentially rework. The second bucket is time overruns… And the last one is risks associated with regulatory requirements or not meeting the specification.”

Each of these areas offers opportunities for digital intervention.

On the cost side, better design coordination can reduce rework. On the time side, digital systems can identify delayed decisions and approvals before they affect the construction schedule. On the compliance side, a common digital environment can ensure that different stakeholders are working from the same information. One of the simplest examples illustrates the potential impact.

“Every core cut on a site is a design failure. It is not a construction failure,” Bagalkotkar said.

A core cut may appear to be a construction issue, but if the requirement had been identified during design, the intervention could potentially have been avoided altogether. This is precisely where BIM can create value — moving problem-solving upstream, when changes are cheaper and easier to implement.

From digital drawings to digital projects

The infrastructure industry has already moved from paper drawings to CAD and increasingly towards BIM. The next step is to ensure that digitalisation does not stop at design.

A BIM model created merely to satisfy a tender requirement has limited value. The larger opportunity comes when the same digital model is used throughout the project.

As Bagalkotkar explained, successful implementations are those where organisations begin digitally at the concept-design stage, carry the model through detailed design and then use it during construction rather than simply converting it into conventional drawings.

The result can eventually be a digital representation of the completed asset. This is particularly important for infrastructure assets that may remain operational for decades. Construction data can potentially flow into operations and maintenance, providing asset owners with a more comprehensive information base for future decisions.

Such an approach also creates the foundation for digital twins, intelligent monitoring and predictive maintenance.

Technology has to pay for itself

Despite its potential, technology adoption cannot be driven by technology alone. Infrastructure projects operate in a highly competitive commercial environment. Developers and contractors need to justify additional investments in digital systems through measurable improvements in cost, productivity, quality or asset performance.

Satyanarayan Purohit, VP & HOD, Dilip Buildcon, made this point clearly. “Any technology unless it gives the business benefit… at least we as contractors are not going to implement it.” Dilip Buildcon’s experience with ERP illustrates the point. According to Purohit, the company's ERP implementation has delivered significant cost savings, while integrated systems are also being used to manage its large equipment fleet.

The lesson is straightforward: digital adoption accelerates when the commercial return is visible. This also explains why technology adoption varies across infrastructure segments. BIM, for example, becomes particularly valuable in complex projects where multiple disciplines and interfaces need to be coordinated. In metro and industrial projects, the consequences of design conflicts can be substantial.

Highway projects, by comparison, have been slower to adopt BIM at scale.

De-risking the project before bidding

This gap points towards another major opportunity — using technology to de-risk infrastructure projects before contractors bid for them.

Today, uncertainty in project information can ultimately become a commercial risk. Unknown site conditions, incomplete surveys, utility conflicts, design changes and unclear quantities can all influence the price and risk premium built into a bid.

A more technology-intensive DPR and feasibility process could change this.

Satellite data, drones, LiDAR, digital terrain models and engineering databases can provide a much clearer picture of site conditions before a project reaches the bidding stage.

Chaabra believes India needs to move in this direction. “In India, we are adopting a technology on a need basis, not proactively thinking in that direction.”

The road sector could be a significant beneficiary of such a shift. If a highway project reaches the tendering stage with a stronger digital foundation, contractors can potentially bid with greater certainty, while authorities can receive more informed bids. Investors, meanwhile, can evaluate the project based on a stronger set of underlying assumptions.

The concept is simple: de-risk the project before transferring the risk to the contractor or investor.

Technology's role does not end when construction is completed. For long-life infrastructure, asset performance is increasingly becoming a critical part of investment decisions. A road or bridge that requires repeated repairs can significantly alter its lifecycle economics.

This is driving interest in predictive maintenance. Purohit pointed to the shift from conventional reactive maintenance towards technology-enabled predictive approaches. “Initially there was a reactive, now we are doing predictive maintenance.”

By monitoring cracks, stresses and other indicators of deterioration, asset owners can potentially identify problems before they become failures. This is particularly relevant as India's infrastructure network expands and the responsibility for maintaining these assets increasingly shifts towards developers, concessionaires and institutional investors.

The objective is not simply to know what has failed, but to know what is likely to fail next. That represents a significant change in the economics of infrastructure maintenance.

The next infrastructure advantage

Technology, however, will not automatically eliminate risk. Adoption requires investment, skills, institutional support and, most importantly, a change in mindset. Owners need to define digital requirements early. Consultants need to incorporate technology into planning and design. Contractors need to build digital capabilities. Technology providers need to demonstrate tangible business value. And authorities need to recognise that spending more time and resources during the planning stage can reduce much larger costs during execution and operations.

The infrastructure industry is therefore moving towards a new understanding of digitalisation. It is no longer just about automating drawings, tracking equipment or maintaining databases. It is about creating visibility across the entire asset lifecycle.

For developers and investors, that visibility can make the difference between accepting risk and understanding it.

As Purohit summed up: “Technology always helps us… without business use, it is not going to go that way.” The next phase of India's infrastructure growth will demand more than faster construction. It will require projects that can withstand financial, operational, environmental and technological uncertainties over decades.

Technology could become the industry's most important tool in achieving that. The ultimate objective is not to build digital projects for their own sake. It is to build infrastructure where risks are identified earlier, decisions are better informed and assets deliver value for longer.

This article is based on the panel discussion titled ‘Technology as a Risk-Mitigation Tool for Developers & Investors’, held at RAHSTA 2026 on July 9, 2026.